Australian quartet
Last Dinosaurs deliver a sound that harks back to the rhythmic 2000s indie of bands like
Phoenix,
the Kooks, and
Two Door Cinema Club, serving sharp and polished dance-rock. The band formed in 2007 while frontman
Sean Caskey and drummer
Dan Koyama were still in high school. They later recruited
Caskey's brother Lachlan on guitar and
Sam Gethin-Jones on bass. Their debut EP,
Back from the Dead, was released in 2010. Their breakthrough full-length arrived in 2012.
In a Million Years (Dew Process Records) was produced by Jean-Paul Fung (
Silverchair,
Jet) and debuted in the Top Ten on the Australian albums chart. The band toured in support of the album, touching down in Europe, Africa, Australia, and Asia, where they placed particular focus in large part because of
the Caskeys' and
Koyama's Japanese heritage. In the summer of 2013,
Gethin-Jones parted ways with the group and was replaced by Michael Sloane in early 2014. The new incarnation of the band released the sophomore album
Wellness the next year. Produced by
Scott Horscroft (
Silverchair,
the Presets,
Empire of the Sun),
Wellness added ethereal tones to their existing energetic style and debuted in the Top 20 of the ARIA charts. ~ Neil Z. Yeung